Australia’s favourite sport is AFL, new YouGov poll reveals

There’s no doubt Aussies love their sport. But out of cricket, footy and tennis, a new survey has revealed which one has come out on top.

Australian Rules, rules.

The nation’s glorious homegrown football code has trumped all other sports in a new survey in which Aussies were asked to pick their favourite game.

In the exclusive survey for News Corp, YouGov asked 2297 Australians to pick their number one favourite sport from a list that included four codes of football, netball, tennis, cricket and surfing.

Aussie Rules was the runaway winner, with 23 per cent of the national vote.

It was also the dominant sport in most states, selected by 41 per cent of respondents in Victoria and Western Australia, 38 per cent in South Australia and 35 per cent in Tasmania.

In Queensland, Australian Rules was second only to rugby league, while in NSW it finished fourth, after league, tennis and cricket.

Rugby league was the nation’s second-most popular sport overall, with 13 per cent of the vote, while tennis received 11 per cent, cricket got 10 per cent and football (soccer) managed 8 per cent.

Sydney University sports expert Dr Steve Georgakis said the dominance of Australian Rules football was not surprising, partly because of work the AFL had done behind the scenes over many years.

“The AFL embarked upon a program of becoming the national game in the early ’80s,” he said.

“The way they’ve done that is that they’ve diversified. They’ve got the AFLW, they’ve got diversity programs, they’ve engaged with indigenous communities, and they’ve cleverly made inroads into the rugby states – and they’ve primarily done that at the grassroots level.”

AFL CEO Gillon McLachlan said there was “no doubt” AFL’s success was based on that grassroots activity.

“The support we enjoy is a direct result of the passion and commitment of the thousands of hard-working volunteers at Auskick clinics and community clubs across Australia who continue to inspire kids and ensure our game is accessible, inclusive and fun for all,” he said.

The number of girls and women participating in the game had doubled from 300,000 to 600,000 in the past six years, and the code was also enjoying strong growth in Queensland and NSW, Mr McLachlan said.

Fans celebrate watching a replay of the grand final during the Melbourne Demons AFL Premiership Celebration at Melbourne Cricket Ground on December 5. Picture: Getty

Cricket’s position at number four on the list was a surprise, Dr Georgakis said, but soccer’s position further down the list was not a shock. While it is indisputably “the world game,” it has never become the most popular sport in former British colonies, he said.

While the results of the YouGov survey revealed a nation in love with sport, it also showed the feeling wasn’t quite ubiquitous.

Twenty-eight per cent of respondents said they liked none of the listed sports – suggesting all those people are either massive golf tragics, or the national sporting obsession bores them witless.

Gillon McLachlan, Chief Executive Officer of the AFL. Picture: Getty

Sports expert Dr Steve Georgakis from the University Of Sydney.

Among women, the proportion who didn’t care about sport was even higher – 35 per cent.

And some states that pride themselves on their sport fanaticism may be in for a shock. Thirty-five per cent of Queenslanders expressed zero interest in any of the nominated sports, and in Victoria that figure was 29 per cent.

NSW emerged as the state with the highest proportion of sports lovers.

Recent figures from Ausplay show 8.5 million Australian adults and 3.4 million kids play some form of sport, and an astonishing 2.9 million of us volunteer to help stage community sport.